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Hi, I'm Mike!

Posted: Sat Sep 04, 2021 4:42 pm
by Mike
Thank you, Rob, for taking the time and effort to pull this forum together. I will attempt to keep my introduction reasonably brief, and on topic.

We are a retired couple living in rural Illinois; i.e., NOT Chicago. Both of us had VW Microbuses in our lives, way back when. I grew up with a '65 T1 Deluxe, my wife had two T2s (consecutive) during her first marriage. She was - and more or less still is - the archetypical American hippie, and tells me that, yes, her buses had the big VW logo on the nose covered in daisy stickers in the form of a peace symbol. She wants to do the same with the new one. [...sigh...]

I started "going electric" around 18 years ago, getting my feet wet with a 2002 Ford Th!nk Neighbor, this model meeting the short-lived neighborhood electric vehicle program in the States. This program was ostensibly intended to meet the way-too-soon (2002) California requirement for 5% of all vehicle sales to be alternative-fueled. That program was abandoned in 2003 due to carmaker pressure, their concerns (correctly!) being that the technology/cost was not marketable at the time. I still have the car, which is now on its fifth set of gel lead-acid batteries. Third parties are offering LiPo conversions at nearly twice what the car is worth; I'll pass, thank you.

The current personal fleet beyond the Th!nk is a 2018 Ford Transit medium roof long wheelbase model, and two well-loved Honda Elements, 2003 and 2008 models. So, clearly we have a lot of enthusiasm for the van and van-style people and "stuff" mover format. So the VW Microbus redux is just up our alley.

So fast forward to today, and we are impatiently waiting to jump on the "taking orders" announcement for the "ID.Buzz" or whatever VoA is going to call it in the US. Their Chattanooga manufacturing facility is reported to be in the process of refitting one assembly line targeting a 2023 release. My incentive for being on this UK forum is the early reporting that the Euromarket is slated to see them next year, and maybe I can gauge the anticipated US model experience on enthusiast reporting on this forum.

Re: Hi, I'm Mike!

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2021 3:00 pm
by Rob
Welcome along, more than welcome here and like you say we might have a bit more information on it before you guys but who knows with VW :)

Re: Hi, I'm Mike!

Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2022 10:06 pm
by Steve
Hi Mike and Rob and welcome from a newbie on a newbie site. I’m from the other side of the pond from you and have just placed a pre order on the Buzz. I currently have the id4 and my lovely wife the id3. I’ve always relied on fossil fuels but am now slowly transitioning to ev.